Piano-roll improvements?

[AD80]

Jules, you work so soon on V2.
So no automation improvement in V1. No tooltips above the automation points in V1...

Come on, do you really plan on staying with T1 when T2 comes out . Jules has mentioned before that racks were the last new features before T2.

[RaymondHayter]

Alrighty! Great timing Jules following my other recent post... now, whatever you choose to implement I know you're focussing on my one area of complaint re Tracktion.

ENTERING DATA

- Step entry from midi keyboard
Choose note length and the midi key and velocity is used for the notes. song pointer advances by defined note separation. space bar advances song pointer without entering a note.

- Pattern clipboard
sequences of notes can be cut and paste into a buffer (one of many) that can be pasted elsewhere in the piano roll for the same or different clip. This tool would speed entry of repetitive data without turning Tracktion into a pattern-based sequencer (which is what we don't want)

- Drum Map
A different window or view onto midi data replacing (or complementing) the keyboard with drum labels. Ability to define and save drum maps. Modified behaviour to data entry so dragging the mouse along the piano roll creates multiple midi events (eg. rapid entry of 16th note highhats) based on the 'snap' value.

EDITING DATA

- Selection of notes
Facility to choose all notes based on a combination of criteria such as note range (start & end pitch & bar), velocity range, selection of notes across multiple midi clips, selection of notes across multiple tracks

- Relative and absolute data value changes
eg. +50 to velocity to all selected notes, -1 bar to all selected notes, exactly 1/8 note quantise for all selected notes.

- Humanise / Humanize
Similar to above but system choses to vary velocity and/or timing by a random amount up to a definable limit.

- Fast Paste for repetitive data
Shift-click-then-drag on selected notes duplicates the notes and places them in the position where the mouse button is released. aka FL Studio. very nice & productive feature.

PIANO ROLL NAVIGATION

- replace the current wierd Horizontal scrollbar with a normal one (more like the vertical scrollbar). Or at least move the current one above the top of the tracks where it is more intuitive.


Thanks

Raymond

[loginid]

As a previous logic user, I really got used to the colour of the notes being used to show the velocity values instead of the corresponding bar-graph and would love it if this were to be implemented in Tracktion along with a dedicated 'velocity tool'.

quiet: Blue > Green > Yellow > Red :Loud

I find that I can get more information out of just glancing at a part when I'm editing it if the notes are different colours, and I find that having to turn on a controller view is a cumbersome step in the case of something as commonly used as velocity information.

This method also makes it easier to change the relative velocities of the notes in a chord as the velocity information isn't crammed into one place in the bar-graph at the beginning of the chord.

[loginid]

I agree with Raymondhayter that a Humanise function would be welcome, as would a selective quantise tool.

[glurgle]

Since it's all been done, I'll just give my 'best of'

-Colored Notes (by velocity) can't beleive I never thought of it.
-Modifiers for switching tools: ctrl+drag is copy, shift+drag for editing velocity, and mousewheel button toggles select/draw.
-right click erases notes, you could also use modifiers with the right button (ctrl for copy and shift for paste anyone?)

Those would make *my* ultimate mouse and keyboard setup. but modulR's ideas are super rad as well.

Others:
-notes keep their same offset from the nearest snap point when ctrl+dragged.
-copy and paste would always paste the selected notes starting right at the cursor.
-allowing the pencil tool to move notes by clicking the middle.
-some way of navigating a clip with the keyboard and using 'enter' to drop notes. (how about the number pad? I'm fairly certain the number pad numbers can be seperated from the regular numbers...)
-pinning automation to clips, or even a simple insert space/remove selected area function.
-use a knob to scale velocity of multiple notes *relatively* (+1 -1). I swear I posted this around the time you were working on tempo changes, but could never find that post again.-adjust lengths of multiple notes
-default velocity of 100
-remembering values of last note entered. (length and velocity)
-all the auto-compose/auto-scale stuff should be ignored imho

That should give a fairly comprehensive and responsive/fast piano roll, but I'll be sure to add any other good points I think of ;)

[psylichon]

Also consider that the majority of these midi tweaks can (and should) also be applied to audio editing. Aside from their obvious differences, audio and midi editing should share as many common editing conventions as possible. T3...

But for now MIDI... absolute and relative grid values are getting pretty standard nowadays, and a grid independent of zoom level would make most of my arranging chores a lot easier (though I would like to keep the "floating zoomy grid thingy" as an option). A nudge value seperate from the grid (in time, samples, beats, etc. format?) would rock. Actually that might be in there innit

Haven't messed about with T as much as I should before requesting new features, but I haven't found a way to convert controller data embedded in a midi recording into an automatable envelope, with the option to reassign the envelope's destination possibly?

Lots of good ideas out there... good luck with em all!

[lalo]

Hi Jules!
Hi guys!
For Piano Roll in the future i have these proposals.

Editing midi stuff is a very demanding task sometimes, if you do complex rhythms and polyphonic textures;
so i think all the most editing tools should be very easy to reach in the editing area
I.E.
1. Left Mouse Button : (Pencil) Draw notes
2. Left Mouse Button on the notes' edges : (Pencil) Lenght Modify of notes or group of notes
3. Right Mouse Button : (Arrow) Move/Select Note or group of selected Notes (drag with the right button on a group of notes to select them)
4. Central Mouse Button or Del key : Delete Note or group of Notes
5. Standard windows commands to copy/cut/paste : ctrl+drag (copy and paste in other places),ctrl+ x (cut),ctrl+ v (paste),ctrl+c (copy).
6. A single button to enable/disable quantisation grid (Q ? ) or a button to be depressed when doin all editing stuff with mouse+keyboard to disable the grid
(logic uses alt+shift to disable the grid.
7. Velocity editing : Mouse wheel on selected notes?
or little lines inside the notes to rapresent the velocity and then V+Mouse Drag to modify it...when a group of notes is selected the change in velocity should be relative, if one of the notes reaches its minimum or maximum velocity other notes can be changed in velocity if an additional key is depressed ...i must say that i don't like the cubase-like way of editing velocity 'cause is in a different editing area and 'cause is very unclear in polyphonic situations (even when the hat is sounding together with kick and snare or whatever!!)

Ok...quite a lot...but may be i have other ideas...

lalo

[P.T.]

1) I would like to be able to choose the color of the notes. Different colors for notes in different clips so that I can then overlay the clips to work on harmony parts.

This is something that I found in the Sonar demo when I tried it that I liked very much.

Then either all notes in all overlayed clips should be editable, or maybe a right-click menue that contains a list of all overlayed clips so I can choose the one I want to edit.

( someone previously mentioned different colors for different velocities. These could be different shades of the chosen color.)

2) A way for the user to set the default value for note velocities, instead of the current 127 default value.

[AD80]

6. A single button to enable/disable quantisation grid (Q ? ) or a button to be depressed when doin all editing stuff with mouse+keyboard to disable the grid
(logic uses alt+shift to disable the grid.

Q does dissable snap.

[lalo]

Yes i know m8!
I'm just listing all the stuff...something is here jet something will be...
lalo

[ancientoak]

Looks like I'm a bit late, but I can give my vote for the best ideas - ModuLR's suggestions are excellent, you should really try to adapt some of the general feel of the FL Studio piano roll, his idea for a freely definable drum editor is also great. I also like the idea of colour-coded notes, but please give us an optional extra pane below the piano roll for editing of bar-graph velocity data or other controllers - this is a proven clean and effective way of doing velocity editing.

Humanize function and a faster "destructive" quantize function is essential.

I've gotten used to Tracktions piano roll over the past year (I celebrated our 1 year anniversary making yet another song on february 11th. ) and I do most my recording real-time anyway, but I did manage to convert a friend to Tracktion from FL, and he has a hard time adapting.

[chriss]

A few more suggestions, I would like to be able to loop a midi clip like I would a audio clip, I thinks its strange that audio clips have a loop x2 x4 x6 etch, It should just be a button to turn looping on or off and this should work on both midi and audio clips. Also you need to be able to record from 16 midi channels to 16 different tracks or there needs to be a midi dissolve function. Also If you could integrate modular’s step child and make the note names universal that would be cool IE: if you name C#4 Hard snare 3 than that note has that name in the step sequencer as well as the piano roll. Also a way to import and export the note names you have created then with samples sets you could pack the key mappings.

[psycontinuum]

Just copy the whole way the reason editor works. Thats all it needs

[tha_man]

Agreed! And add an option to hear notes while dragging and painting them.

[glurgle]

Agreed! :) And add an option to hear notes while dragging and painting them.

already exists. The little speaker icon on the pop-up midi toolbar